r/ufyh

I have been unemployed for 2 years. Had to take a break due to physical health reasons first, and then my mental health issues caught up to me. I have tried to declutter and clean my room multiple times during this period, but somehow i never end up having a room that i feel relieved in.

I think the major problem is i don't want to do anything. I just never thought it would come to this - i feel like i had so much potential, so many interests, and everything sort of fizzled out. I just want somebody to give me permission to lay in my room and not do anything, not look for a job, because i feel so fragile and the feeling has lasted for so long. I was doing great at my job until i left, and i just dont want to go back to being so stressed and burnt put, but i also dont have any desire to do or learn anything. Reaching out for mental health support (have ADHD and depression) hasn't helped much because of limited access to professsionals no access to prescribed adhd meds, and i am tired of trying.

I just want to throw away everything and start with a blank slate. But i also know i will regret throwing a few things because i dont want to poke a bigger hole in my savings if i need them again (endless loop, i know). I know i have valid reasons to feeling tired because of various things at home, but i feel like i am not trying enough.

I just thought i would know how to handle this better at 31F, and not get so worse. Im sorry, this might not be the right place for it but the posts in this community make me so happy and i'm so proud of everyone who is trying and making progress (or not).

I just wish i could unfuck my room, and life. But i just don't know what to do anymore. I have read countless advice and books, and actually made progress too, but just stuck again and again. Also not having accessible places to donate stuff has been a roadblock with things i already decluttered, but i guess i just have to give myself permission to throw them away.

I haven't been there for anyone these 2 years (mpstly isolated from toxic dynamics and then didn't have the energy to explain my situation to anyome irl, also maybe started to experience empathy and caregiver fatigue, and just surviving doing the bare minimum), but i guess this is me putting something out there to hold myself accountable (or a cry for help?).

Sorry for being a downer and typing a long ass post. Will try to muster up energy to move or declutter a few things from now.. and will try to forget about how long it took me to be here, and maybe count this as the start line. The time has passed anyway, and i can do nothing about it now.

can I just say it's so nice sleeping in my bed with only bed stuff on it and not having to walk on things or over them to get to my bed. and waking up to a clear floor (that I vacuumed) or if it has stuff on it it's not rubbish and seeing my wardrobe door open easily (even though it's the one area I need to tackle next).

I’m leaving for a trip tomorrow afternoon (Thursday) and I really need to get my place (1 br, small kitchen, living room, tiny bathroom) before I leave because the cat sitter will be here.

I got rid of all the trash and I’ve done some picking up, but every surface is covered with stuff and dirty, I have big piles of stuff all over - but I had a brutal work day followed by an emotional therapy session and I’m so overwhelmed!!

I leave tomorrow at 12:30pm. And I feel like I’m drowning a lil.

What would you guys do?
Any advice would be so appreciated!!

New property management coming tomorrow at 3 for a walkthrough…I lost my job end of last month (they don’t know that yet) dancing dangerously close to an eviction and I have been calling and calling trying to get my dog and cat placed somewhere no one is taking and my greatest fucking fear is they end up at animal control where the guy who runs it would make Satan look holy…

Also I haven’t had my mental health meds for close to a week so my sleep schedule is FUCKED

Finally crashed at 12 noon today woke up at 5 to a voicemail from the lady at the property management company saying they will be here tomorrow at 3 for a walkthrough. I immediately text her asking if we can push it back like by a week she says no

So I’ve been in damage control mode all night

See my city has this rule you either have to have their green bags (10 bucks a roll) or stickers or the trash people won’t take anything. I had been desperately funneling all my money to the rent so yeah it’s gotten BAD

What I have done tonight

Bedroom is swept took me two hours of steady work with needing longer breaks due to the fact I don’t have an AC and it’s 81 in the house. Moved all the trashbags into the tv room (informed the lady I would be doing this as you cannot just sit trash at the curb unless it’s within 24 hours of trash day which ofc was today)

Tomorrow I need to get the living room swept up (honestly hiding things under things hides a LOT of sins I.e under the bed under a chair etc) and the kitchen and truthfully IF I have time the floors desperately need scrubbed but that’s IF I have time. I was getting weak sweaty shaky and chest pain from all the stress so I decided to call it quits for the night. I have no one who can help me the only one who might is my ex neighbor but she’s dealing with the same thing at her place(I used to have every two week inspections )all my family is dead and this may be the lack of meds talking but it feels like the damn walls are closing in. Even if I were to self admit to the psych ward id still have my current problem and be cut off from the one real source of support I do have who lives out of state

I’m so tired like bone deep exhausted

Because, truly, I'm starting to think it may be impossible to keep a space consistently clean unless you're neurotypical.

Conversely, any neurotypicals here who just aren't good at not fucking the habitat?

Hello people of Reddit! This is going to be a long post, but if you’ve dealt with or are dealing with moths, you know how distressing it can be. They are notoriously difficult to get rid of once you have an infestation. I’ve been dealing with an infestation for about two years now, and we’re finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, so I figured I would write up as much information as I can about our war with these little buggers, share what worked and what didn’t, and hopefully help out anyone who is in the thick of their own moth battle. So, without further ado, here’s a detailed account of how I finally defeated the evil.

I first noticed the presence of moths in our house in the spring of 2024. I still don’t definitively know where they came from, but I did acquire some large batches of secondhand yarn around that time from various sources, and we are big thrift enjoyers so there’s lots of possible sources. Learn from my mistakes. If you’re into thrifting or acquiring anything secondhand, closely inspect any fabric or yarn that’s coming into your home. IMMEDIATELY upon bringing it inside, freeze it for 48 hours if you can, wash it in hot water if you can, and give any furniture a thorough vacuuming. I did not do any of these things and paid dearly for it.

My second mistake was waiting too long to take action. I saw a few moths flying around the house, but didn’t take much notice. I was living in Missouri at the time and it’s very common to have bugs coming into the house as the weather gets warm. I figured they just came in through a window, and I didn’t even know what they were. It took a couple months of seeing more and more every day before I finally thought to Google what they might be, and I was horrified to discover the truth.

Our first attempted treatment was a failure. We deep cleaned every corner of the house we could, went through all of the yarn and threw out anything that looked compromised, washed every article of clothing and linens we owned, wiped down all of our surfaces with undiluted white vinegar, but they stubbornly hung on. They even managed to follow us to our new home when we moved to Minnesota, and we found ourselves killing multiple of them a day.

Our second treatment, the most recent, has been much more successful, and I’m hopeful we’ll actually achieve full eradication this time! Here’s what we did this time around. For reference, I live in a ~1000 sq ft fully carpeted apartment (minus the kitchen) and this took three people and about two and a half long days.

Firstly, we went about it much more systematically, cleaning one room from start to finish before moving on to the next. This prevented clean rooms from getting re-contaminated as we went. We moved all the furniture and vacuumed every square inch of the carpet. We also took everything out of the dressers and off the shelves so we could wipe them down with undiluted white vinegar. After vacuuming, we used a permethrin spray (more detail on that later), let it dry, and vacuumed again. Pay extra attention to closets, corners, any nooks and crannies that are dark and not often touched. Those are moths’ favorite places to hang out and breed. We found the buggers hiding INSIDE OF OUR THERMOSTAT. Not gonna lie, I took that a little personally. Once a room was cleaned, we closed the door and opened all the windows to let lots of fresh air circulate. We also used clean rooms to store items that had been inspected and confirmed to be moth-free.

The best way I found to inspect items is to bring it to a room with good lighting or, even better, to a window where natural light can come in. You’re looking for frass, aka moth egg casings. It kind of looks like dandruff. Take extra care to check under collars, in pockets, under seams, between the pages of books, those little hidden spots where they can burrow in unnoticed. This process is super tedious but it will save your life in the end. Anything that can go through the wash should go through on the hottest cycle, and through the dryer on the hottest setting. You can also add a splash of white vinegar to the wash cycle for extra security. Anything not machine washable needs to either be dry cleaned or frozen. For freezing, leave it in the freezer for at least 48 hours, then at room temperature for 24, and back in the freezer for 48. Repeat this 2-3 times. This will take a while, so get a bunch of vacuum-seal space bags to pack stuff away after it’s washed so it won’t get recontaminated.

Next, like I mentioned before, we treated our home with a permethrin spray. I think this is one of the key things we did. I was very hesitant about this as we have three cats, and I’ve heard countless times that permethrin can be deadly to them. However, upon doing further research, I learned that most cases of permethrin toxicity come from a cat coming into contact with dog flea/tick treatment, which generally has a concentration of 40-45% permethrin, while the majority of bug sprays have a concentration of 0.5%, and are safe for cats to be around once dry. Still, out of an abundance of caution, we removed our fur babies from the home for two days while we did the treatment, and circulated plenty of fresh air throughout the home to ensure the treatment was completely dry before bringing them back home. Permethrin is not toxic to dogs or humans, only cats, so if you don’t have cats in the home you can be much more liberal with this. It kills almost any flying insect on contact, and stays effective for around 30 days after treatment. We used the Ben’s Clothing & Gear Insect Repellant Spray, and went through about 2 full 24oz bottles for a ~1000 sq ft fully carpeted apartment.

The instructions say to spray the garment or area until it is visibly soaked, but we used a good deal less, just a light mist over everything. It dried within minutes. We sprayed every inch of the carpet and all the furniture, even the cat trees, and none of our cats have had any kind of reaction since we did this almost a month ago now. I’m not a vet, so please take this as anecdotal evidence only, and talk with your vet if you’re nervous about using permethrin in a home with cats.

Pretty much every other product we’ve used came from Dr. Killigan’s. We’ve been going through their pheromone traps for two years, changing them every 30 days or so, and the Six Feet Under spray is amazing for kill-on-contact when you see an adult moth on the wall. I used the Dust to Dust Insect Powder in the vents and along baseboards, and placed Cedar Chip Canisters in all the closets. I can’t sing the praises of Dr. Killigan’s products enough. Everything they sell is made from natural ingredients, safe for kids and pets, and it WORKS. I would recommend buying directly from their website instead of on Amazon, because their customer service team is much more helpful than Amazon’s if you have any questions or issues with a product. Not sponsored, just a very happy customer!

The last thing that I think really turned the tide in our favor is trichogramma wasps. For the unfamiliar, these little guys are tiny, almost microscopic little wasps whose favorite snack is moth eggs. They hunt down the eggs and eat the larvae from the inside out before they even hatch. The trick is to keep ordering and deploying them weekly for at least 2-3 months, because moth breeding cycles are about a month long. We got ours from Arbico Organics and have been very pleased with the pricing and ease of ordering, plus their customer service team is awesome at helping you figure out what species and quantity you need. 6 cards seems to be the perfect amount for our home, so adjust your order accordingly based on the size of your home.

We did the big clean over the last weekend of April 2026, and have slowly been working on getting all of our items back where they go. I still have a lot of clothes and yarn in space bags, but all the furniture is back in its spot. The problem isn’t completely gone yet. I still see anywhere from 1-3 adults a day, and promptly kill them, but it seems to be getting fewer and farther between as the days go by. I vacuum every Friday and Sunday, and sometimes an extra vacuum on a weeknight if I find the energy, and a few times a day I do a “patrol” around the apartment to look for any evildoers that might be fluttering around. It’s disheartening to see them, I won’t lie, but I know we’re moving in the right direction. At the time of writing this (May 19^(th) 2026), I haven’t seen a single moth in about two days. I plan to keep ordering the trichogramma wasps until I've gone at least three weeks without a single sighting, as is recommended by Arbico. I am feeling hopeful for the first time in two years that this nightmare might be coming to an end. This whole thing has been incredibly distressing for me, as someone with OCD (one of my OCD themes is even about bugs) and an avid knitter who had to say goodbye to about ¾ of my yarn. I wouldn’t wish it on anybody.

I can’t imagine I forgot anything in 1600+ words, but please feel free to ask questions or share any other strategies you’ve found to be successful. If you’re dealing with moths, just know there is hope. It’s not easy and will make you feel crazy, but with the right tools and some extra pairs of hands, freedom is possible! Good luck and godspeed to you all!

I need to clean the 2nd room soon, as a roomie is moving in the first week of June. Things have to go but the problem is that most of those things are broken stuff or just for recycling. I keep every single wrap because I don't like being wasteful. I try to find an use for everything... and I have way more things than I can take care of.

I feel guilty! I know that I am fighting an endless fight since I can't stop any of the mess going on the world. I want to find a use for everything but I am not a recycling plant. And I just can't find a way to let go of all the stuff I can't give a new use to. I know it's kind of a control thing, you know, not feeling in control and hoarding stuff to get the feeling. But at least the next room has to be cleaned soon before I box everything up and forget about it for ages.

Has anyone felt this way? How do you cope with the feeling of being wasteful?

I cannot even bother to get out of bed. I need to clean. I want to. I cannot get my brain to do so.

I feel like I am finally beginning to make progress on my home and just wanted to share how good it feels. It is no where even close to presentable, but I have focused on making meaningful progress everyday instead of trying to conqour a disaster in a weekend's time.

The expectation to take it from fucked to unfucked overnight is what has been holding me back, and releasing myself from that expectation has made all the difference.

Just wanted to share I'm proud of myself and offer encouragement to others to keep working to find a mindset that works for you. If you could shame yourself into unfucking your habitat, all of us would have done it by now.

My main focus has been NOT fucking anything any further (cleaning up messes, throwing away trash, etc as they happen) and focusing on making at least 1 step towards meaningful progress on whats already been fucked- cleaning a surface, wiping down a counter, taking out a bag of trash.

The level a lot of us are at is not "I need to mop twice a week," it's having a floorspace you can walk on that's functional. Let clearing the floor be the first goal. It doesn't have to be perfect.

Anyone else looking for accountability and support please feel free to gather here. We got this, we just got to quit beating ourselves up in the chase of perfection.

Finally getting things together after years of not meeting the bar and my husband pointed out something interesting to me.

I get the most done when it is most inconvenient or when I feel my worst.

For example I have rearranged the furniture to get a better desk in place at 1 am after three months of putting it off. Or today when I have been dead sick for two weeks (while waking up extra to feed a sick and fussy baby at nights) SUDDENLY my doom room felt doable and I sorted/trashed/donated six garbage bags worth of STUFF.

Is this just me or is this a thing?!? How do I keep the momentum when I’m feeling good again?

My living space has been in a state that looks like I suffer from hoarding disorder, I am disabled but don't have that specifically and my space causes me a lot of additional issues that has a negative impact on me and I absolutely have been bothered by this for well over a year as it's slowly gotten worse. Because of how. many barriers there are to me fixing it, until extremely recently I kind of thought that this was just how I exist now, I stopped living a while ago and have just deteriorated so much since with no sign of improvement or capacity to create meaningful progress. Blah blah blah you get the idea, I only want to give details that actually pertain to this issue specifically to communicate what I need to.

A lot of what I have to do is essentially tetris-like, so much in the way and that needs to be moved around, and the way I'm actually managing to make progress means that I can't stop to organise every thing as I come across it even though I literally want to, it's not that it'd be distracting or waste time for me but that nothing has a place to return to properly right now...So I can organise things if I want, but then there's nowhere to put them, they inevitably will end up dumped into a temporary storage solution (anything I have) to clear space for something to be moved, etc, which isn't meant for it and I have to make use of what I have so other stuff has to go into those same containers for now too, rendering any organising I do without somewhere for the items to go as absolutely pointless...

Which leads onto my question, how do you manage possessions in the mean time? I've used totes and baskets or boxes but it's just so overwhelming and "upsetting" basically?, I'm giving myself a future problem far larger than it would be in the current until I can get to the point / manage to move things around to open up the space for things to go and actually be organised into like I want... I'm actually a very organised, particular person, ironically... I just used some plastic cups to temporarily section out some things on one surface (that need to stay there, but having them loose is worse right but I don't have enough of anything really to continue doing that? And not everything is as easy to contain as a few lighters and my keys, plus I'm really tired of opening a box or finding an item that I know should be grouped together with other things but I just don't fucking have somewhere to put that right now, I'm starting on one box of things that I need to use semi regularly but that's just one box of some self care and wound care items, and that still is going to take time. I can't really mentally handle how slow this way of doing things is with this issue persisting specifically, if that makes sense? It's the one thing making me want to not bother, and I can't afford to not bother anymore.

I know a lot of people say to just shove everything into a box temporarily, and that makes sense for larger cleaning sessions, when I have occasionally managed to spend a few hours cleaning here and there I do that too as they're two different processes, but it isn't viable for how I'm going about this right now... I'm just picking the closest thing to me to do, but I'm already having to ignore things I want to do because nothing has a home so it just feels like I'm shuffling my shit around which is so fucking demotivating honestly